Roaring Heterosexuals
by yourmanwatson
Summary: "You know, when we first moved in here, you never told Mrs. Hudson we'd be needing two beds…" In which both Sherlock and John begin to question John's sexuality. Will be multi-chaptered.
1. What have I done?

Disclaimer: Not mine, yada yada.

—

"You know, when we first moved in here, you never corrected her."

Sherlock didn't even look up. "Sorry?" All John could see was a section of wild Sherlock-hair sticking out from above the laptop—_his _laptop!—that Sherlock was hunched over, and all he'd been hearing for the past few hours were the sporadic sounds of Sherlock's fingers hitting the keys, silence, tapping and muttering, and, occasionally, an episode of furious clicking, as if Sherlock was launching an assault on John's keyboard with renewed vigor.

"When we first moved in here, Mrs. Hudson—she assumed we'd only be needing one bedroom. Why didn't you, ah, you know—"

"Convince her of our heterosexuality?" Sherlock's eyes appeared above the laptop and met John's across the coffee table. _My God, he actually looked up._ "Well, that would be a pointless endeavor on my part, seeing as how I am, in fact, homosexual—we established that at Angelo's, did we not?—and as for you, John, I have never leapt to help you defend your supposed heterosexuality, due to the simple fact that I would never have been able to get a word in edgewise. You have always seemed more than capable of defending yourself in this regard." Was he imagining it, or was Sherlock _smirking_? "Now, seeing as how you've been glancing back and forth between me and your feet for the past two or so hours, opening and closing your mouth—not to mention rubbing the back of your neck, you do that when you're nervous—either my orientation is not 'all fine,' as you have reassured me, or _you _have something to tell me."

John was at a loss for words. "I—I…what?"

Sherlock sighed and snapped the laptop shut. "You're remarkably touchy on this issue, John, yet you keep bringing it up. So, either you've got a problem with me and my orientation, or you're struggling with yours yourself." Sherlock cocked his head to one side, eyes curious. "And as you know, reading human emotions is not my fortê—so I honestly can't tell which it is."

"I am NOT…gay!" spluttered John.

Sherlock shrugged. "I'm not necessarily implying that you're gay; there's a whole spectrum you know. You could be gay, pansexual, bisexual, bi-curious—"

"No. No, no, no. I'm not…_any_ of those things, I—I don't know how you came to that conclusion, Sherlock, but you're wrong. Really, really wrong."

"Am I?" John fully expected Sherlock to point out that his deductions were infallible, but instead he said quietly: "I still think—and tell me if I'm mistaken—but, that night at Angelo's…" Sherlock's eyes were unreadable, but for the briefest of seconds there was a flash of…something…across his face. Pain? Annoyance? "…I haven't been able to get it out of my head. What exactly were you asking me, John?"

Why the hell was he bringing _that_ up? "I was NOT asking you out. I thought you understood—God, Sherlock!" John huffed, agitated. "I don't know what you're playing at. You can't just sit here and _inform_ me that I'm gay! You! You, of all people! What do you know about sexuality? Hell, what do you even know about love? Oh no, you're not gay; you haven't loved anyone in your life—_you're not capable of it! _I'm not going to sit here and be lectured by a sociopath, a sociopath who's trying to convince me that we're both cock-sucking fags!"

He stood up and left, slamming the door behind him.

—

John didn't know where he was going, he'd forgotten even to grab a coat, and though it was only the beginning of October, the sun had long set and it was cold. He stumbled down the steps, cursing when he almost landed flat on his face. Stopping by the nearest streetlamp, he stood for a moment and considered his options. Immediately Sarah's crossed his mind. He was reluctant, though—what if Sarah asked him what was the matter? He was clearly upset, and he didn't really feel like explaining to her: 'Oh, well, today my flatmate tried to convince me that I'm gay.'

His only other options were Harry or Mycroft, though.

_Bugger._

—

Sarah looked a bit groggy and confused, but not too annoyed. After John told her that he and Sherlock had had another fight—"You two seem to do that an awful lot," she had said amusedly—she made a cup of tea and brought him a pillow and a blanket for the couch. They stayed up and talked for a bit—not about Sherlock, obviously, John made sure to keep the conversation steered _well_ away from Sherlock—and then John was left alone, watching the fan on the ceiling whir in slow circles.

It took a tremendous amount of willpower—more than he'd like to admit—not to think of Sherlock in the few minutes before he drifted off to sleep.

—

Waking up with his face pressed into the semi-familiar pattern of the couch cushions, the first thought that crossed John's mind was: _Sarah's. I'm at Sarah's. What did Sherlock and I fall out about now?_

Then: _Oh, fuck._

It was all laid before him now with unbearable clarity—how quiet Sherlock's voice had gotten when he had asked him about Angelo's, the insults he had hurled at him in return, the look on Sherlock's face when he had called him a—

_I am such a bloody_ idiot_. _

He was halfway out the door when he realized he had put Sarah's slippers on. Muttering curse words under his breath, he managed to locate his own shoes and was out the door with a quick shout of: "Got to go!" aimed in the general direction of the stairs.

_I'm an idiot I'm an idiot I'm an idiot I'm an idiot_

"I'm an idiot." John didn't bother with knocking or any other preliminaries, just marched right into the living room and addressed Sherlock directly. Well, more like addressed the top of Sherlock's head directly. Sherlock was exactly as he'd left him yesterday, sitting on the couch, intently hunched over John's laptop. He didn't look up when John entered, didn't show any signs that he heard him. Had he even moved at all since yesterday?

"I'm sorry. For everything. All the stupid things I said." John continued to address the top of Sherlock's head. "You were right. Not about the—you know, me being gay and all—but, about the…well, me being a homophobic arse. There's no excuse for my behavior; I shouldn't have called you a sociopath, I shouldn't have used the words…" John winced, and Sherlock finally looked up at him. Taking a deep breath, he continued: "I shouldn't have used the words 'cock-sucker' and 'fag'—not to describe you, not to describe anyone. I—I believe you that you're gay, and by the way, you're not a sociopath, even though you say you are, and I've said you are—I've seen you display emotion, and I think…I _know_ you're capable of love, I just think your gigantic brain trips you up sometimes, but that doesn't matter, you're brilliant, and your being gay doesn't matter either, I—" John stopped, blinking. "I think I've lost what I was trying to say." Sherlock was smiling.

"Anyway, uh, point is, I won't ever call you those names again, and…if you, er, ever need someone to talk to about…you know, anything you've gone through or are going through, I promise I won't judge, and…I'm here, I won't…last night won't happen. Ever again. Ok?"

"Apology accepted." Sherlock stood up and handed John back his laptop, a rare gesture-when he was done with it, he usually just tossed it into the nearest pile of assorted objects. He headed towards the kitchen.

"We're going out for breakfast." John wasn't sure where the words came from. But oh well, too late now. Besides, Sherlock took such atrocious care of himself, he probably hadn't eaten in days.

"Are we?" Sherlock's head popped around the corner. "Good, there's nothing in the fridge, and I haven't eaten in—"

"Days? Weeks, maybe?" John guessed. "Yeah, I figured. I don't suppose if I lecture you again about the importance of taking care of your body, you'll actually listen this time?"

"Nope." Sherlock stuck his arm under the couch and waved it back and forth, evidently hoping to find his shoes. "Where are we going?"

"L'Eto. They have those good apple—"

"—crêpes, I know. Good choice."

"Sherlock?"

"Hmm?"

"Your shoes." John pointed to a pile of…_something_…near the fireplace, under which Sherlock's oxfords could be seen poking out.

"Ah. Thank you." Sherlock had them on, laced, and was out the door before John could so much as blink.

"Sherlock! Wait up!"

John muttered something under his breath before dashing out. He didn't put it past Sherlock to eat all the crêpes.

—

Please review! Next chapter up soon. Let me know if I'm getting any major terms/places/details wrong, I'm American! XD


	2. Out to breakfast

The crêpes were fantastic.

Sherlock's mad dash out the door of 221B had somehow or another turned into a race-"Sherlock, you cheater! I hope you realize this doesn't count!"-a race in which both contestants had attempted numerous times to trip each other, and which had ended with both stumbling/pushing each other into L'eto's, quite out of breath and grinning like idiots.

John didn't quite know what to expect from Sherlock sometimes.

"John, can I take you up on your offer?"

"Erm, what?" John looked up, mouth full of crêpe and slightly befuddled.

"Your offer. You said-if there was anything I wanted to talk to you about…" John nearly choked. Christ-talk about unexpected.

"Yes, yes, of course," he said hastily, internally scrambling to arrange his facial features into an expression that exuded reassurance rather than shock. "If you want to-I mean, it's good that-go ahead." He waved his hand in a vague motion, gesturing for him to talk.

The left corner of Sherlock's mouth twitched upwards in a smile. He reached for his cup of coffee and held it with both hands, fingers splayed over the china. He stared pensively into the brown liquid for a few moments. "I know you don't think of me as being an overtly sexual person-maybe, until now, you hadn't even thought about my sexuality at all-but…I'm gay, John. I've known for a while. Though finding out was not a particularly easy process…it's not something one can instantaneously deduce about oneself, not something one can wake up and 'just realize' one day…it's a very strange, murky area, this field of love and sexuality and emotions…"

"So...how did you find out?"

"I found out in uni. Until that point, I had never had any real feelings of attraction towards anyone. I had been considering the possibility that I might be asexual." _Fair enough_, John thought. Up till now, he'd thought so too.

"And then I met Sebastian."

John blinked. "The-the Sebastian I met the other day? The one who paid us over £20,000?"

Sherlock nodded. "The one and the same."

John's mind flashed back to the brief meeting he'd had with Sebastian, and he started to get a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. _Oh, no_…

"He was my roommate. When I first met him, I-I experienced some feelings that were confusing to me. I chose to ignore them. But as time went on, I found I simply couldn't ignore the evidence. He was attractive. Relatively popular. Appropriately awed my my intellect and powers of deduction, and kind to me when most others weren't. When he was nearby, the physical evidence was also quite apparent: my increased staring, dilation of the pupils, increased heartbeat, increased breathing rate-"

John was smiling.

"What?" asked Sherlock, confused.

"Nothing, it's just-cute. The way you measure love and affection, as if it were a scientific process."

"_Cute_?" echoed Sherlock, with clear disproval.

"Well…endearing. Sorry."

Sherlock "hhmphed" but carried on. "So one day, I decided to tell him. We had, I thought, gotten to be good friends at that point, and I thought, 'what's the worst that can happen? Even if he rejects me, they're just human emotions, so trivial and mundane…'" Sherlock paused and stared down into his empty coffee mug with a wry smile. A minute passed. A worried frown grew on John's face.

"Sherlock?" John asked gently. "It's okay, you don't have to tell me if you don't-"

Sherlock said flatly: "He laughed at me, mocked me in front of his friends, informed me that he had a boyfriend-a boyfriend who he had been having me spy on all this time and I hadn't even known it. Not a clue. My deductions are brilliant, flawless when it comes to anything else, but as soon as I make the mistake of falling in love my mind becomes so clouded with emotion that I fail to recognize the most obvious of signs. Fat lot of good my reasoning powers are then."

"Sherlock-"

"You know," Sherlock mused, "I really don't see the point of emotions. Yes, alright, from an evolutionary standpoint we know that they've evolved as a mechanism to help us recognize and respond to changes in our environment, but at times they can be quite unnecessary and even debilitating. And love! What on earth is the point of love? Useless feelings of attachment and dependency which only tie us down and limit our freedom-"

"On the contrary," John interrupted quietly, "I think love can enrich our lives and show us what it really means to be human." Sherlock blinked. John hesitated, not wanting to sound offensive or drudge up painful memories. "It sounds like you haven't had the best of luck in love, yet. But," he said, smiling wryly. "I haven't exactly either. I've dated two girls who both dumped me preemptively because they thought I was gay, and well…no matter how available I am, no one wants to date an old, wounded ex-army doctor, do they?"

Sherlock's face lit up in understanding. "Oh. _Oh_. _That's_ why you're so sensitive about that topic. Me calling you gay…_oh_, it all makes sense _now_…"

John coughed. "Erm, yes...let's not, ah, go telling that story to everyone, alright?"

Sherlock nodded seriously. "Of course. I trust you with my story as well, John."

John stopped to consider that for a minute. This was, after all, nothing short of a miracle. Sherlock Holmes, _the_ Sherlock Holmes, confided in no one, showed no weaknesses, only intellectual superiority and at times brutality. Why on earth was he telling him this, especially after John had insulted him last night?

_He's vulnerable. For the first time I've ever seen, Sherlock Holmes is letting himself be_ vulnerable_. _

John reached across the table and placed his hand on top of Sherlock's. "You idiot," he said, grinning. "I'd never tell anybody."

"I appreciate that." said Sherlock, contemplating John's hand. Sherlock's hand twitched, and his other hand rose up an inch off the table, as if he was going to cover John's with it. Instead he suddenly rose to his feet, looking like a very urgent matter had just come to his attention.

"What is it?" John asked, hand still outstretched on the table, looking very bemused.

"I just remembered an important errand I have to run. Sooner than later." Sherlock paused, reached into his wallet, thumbed through a stack of bills, slapped enough to pay for their meal plus a generous tip onto the table, nodded to John, and then turned on his heel.

"Wait! Sherlock!" John shouted exasperatedly. "When are you going to be back?"

Sherlock waved his hand dismissively. "Soon enough." And with that, he was gone.

John sighed and rubbed his temple.

"Oh, Joooohn." John looked up. _What the-_ Somehow, Sherlock's voice carried all the way down the street.

"Now would be a good time to get caught up on all your missed hours at the clinic!"

_Damn._

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